What sort of a How does it look by the coast line with the mouth of the Teifi. headland is Pen Cemais? Is it high or low? from the sea? To leave this question of the name, I may point out that the Mabinogion give no indication that Cemais was not a part of Dyfed: indirectly I think that of Pwyll does the contrary. The poet Cynddelw-his name is to be pronounced as a dissyllable with the accent on the first syllable-refers (Myv., vol. i, p. 228) to Dyfed as 'bro seithbeu dyued' that is the country of Dyfed's seven pagi; for 'beu' is the mutated form of what we write 'pau'-it might be put into French as 'cher pays,'-in our patriotic song Hen Wlad fy Nhadau,' sometimes Nadau in Morgannwg, as the Pentrefwr can testify. Now the 'seithbeu' or 'septem pagi' of Cynddelw can only have meant the 'Seith Cantref Dyued' mentioned more than once in the Mabinogion of Pwyll and Manawyddan, the seven original cantrefs of Dyved, before Pwyll's son, Pryderi, had added to them. The lists of the cantrefs of Wales, together with the commots composing them, vary very much in different manuscripts, and it would be a very useful piece of work if they were to be carefully studied and explained by a trained historian. The seven here in question, as given from the Red Book of Hergest in the Oxford edition of the Bruts, are the following: Emlyn, Kemeis, Cantref Wartha (Upper Cantref), Deugledyf, Pennbrwe, Pebideawc, and Ros. One would like to know how Emlyn and the Upper Cantref, and perhaps more, were filched away from Dyfed; but I expect that is a question already dealt with in Owen's Pembrokeshire. I understand that portions of my native county of Cardigan have also been absorbed by Carmarthenshire. That octopus seems to have been equal to anything, except keeping hold of Gower. The poet Ab Gwilym calls Dyfed generally Bro yr Hud or Gwlad yr Hud, that is to say, the realm of enchantment, glamour and illusion, the story of which, reaching the French romancers, became the theme known as the Enchantments of Britain.' But I think Mr. Evans is warranted in laying his finger on Cemais as the part to which the glamour adhered most thickly : that seems to follow from the stories reproduced in my Celtic Folklore, though I did not perceive it myself. In fact, I did not see the wood for the trees; but the wood is in this case of some importance, for it helps one to understand the story, if one may suppose the whole or most of Cemais to have once been more or less of a forest. Such a forest would serve also to shelter men who landed from the sea in such creeks as Aber Ceibwr. Possibly Llwyd may have been one of them; at any rate, I am inclined to identify him with Liath mac Celtchar of Cualu, the most comely of the Fairy Chiefs of Erin. Now the country called Cualu, genitive Cualann, covered a tract of Ireland reaching from Dublin down as far as Wicklow. For, besides other proofs, Dublin is found called 'Ath Cliath Cualann,' that is, the Hurdle Ford of Cualu (Revue Celtique, vol. xv, p. 455), and in the other direction St. Patrick on his mission to Ireland is said, in the ancient manuscript called the Book of Armagh, to have put in at Inbher Dea in the territories of Cualu (in regiones Coolennorum), and the mouth of the Dea is known to be the Vartry river, which empties itself into the sea near the town of Wicklow. That coast must have been fairly convenient for communication with Dyfed. Cualu becomes in Welsh Cwl, for which there is some sort of Welsh tradition--I cannot find my references just now-that it was the part of Ireland from which Matholwch came, who occupies such a great place in the Mabinogi of Branwen. Somewhere, too, in the county of Wicklow, perhaps within the limits of Cualu, was Esgair Oerfel, whither Arthur went to attack Twrch Trwyth and his Boars. After some fighting, they are represented crossing the sea, and landing at Porth Clais at the mouth of the river Alun, below St. David's. Arthur, following them closely, seems to have landed in the same place, but is said to have spent the night at Mynyw, which I suppose means St. David's. This story, whatever else it may mean, seems based on some tradition as to invasions on the opposite coasts of Wales and Ireland in early times; but whether they are to be regarded chiefly as invasions of Ireland from here, or the reverse, does not seem very clear. The Twrch Trwyth and his Boars suggest to me the ruling family of a tribe whose totem was the wild boar, whose tribesmen were called boars, and whose ancestress was Banba, the lady of the boars, from Irish banbh, a young pig,' Welsh banw, 'a young boar.' Banba is used by Irish poets merely as one of the names of ancient Ireland; and the story of the advent of the Milesian Celts relates how they found Ireland possessed by three kings, whose wives were Eriu, Banba, and Fodla. The first of these goes with our Iwerddon,' and belongs more especially to Munster and the south-west, where the ancient Iverni lived; and possibly Fodla is to be identified with Ulster. The story of Twrch Trwyth seems to me now to settle the position of Banba in the east of Ireland, where we have found Cualu, that is to say, in Leinster. It looks as if the three queens' names reflect a triple division of Ireland in very early times, a sort of division, in fact, at which you would arrive by spreading Munster, Leinster, and Ulster out, so as to cover jointly the whole of the island. There is nothing to connect the Boars with Llwyd and his people except what Mr. Evans has directed attention to, namely, the similarity between the name Llwydawc of one of the principal Boars, and Llwyd's own name. His ingenious conjecture is well worth bearing in mind, though by itself it cannot be considered to identify Llwyd with the Boars under the lead of Twrch Trwyth. This would be an important conclusion if it could be established, as there is more to say about the Boar Lady Banba: I seem to detect her in the Germania as the goddess of a Celtic people who protected their persons with boar amulets. "The story of Llwyd does identify him with an ally called Gwawl, son of Clud; and it was to avenge Gwawl that Llwyd put Dyfed under the spell of his magic. Gwawl's territory seems to have been near that of Hyfeydd Hên, whose name seems to connect him with Maeshyfed (formerly Maeshyfaidd') and Radnor. Now, Gwawl's mother, Clud, seems to have left her name to a district; for the Bruts mention, in the twelfth century, a prince named Einion Clud, that is, Einion of Clud, who is specially associated with the cantref of Elvael. In any case, Clud, as the name of a district, had not gone wholly out of use; for Cynddelw mentions it in his elegy to Cadwallon ab Madog that Cadwallon was brother to Einion Clud, and, in his brotherly way he sent him prisoner to Owen Gwynedd, who delivered him over to the Normans; but in vain, as he managed to escape. He had probably been troublesome. This is how Cynddelw sings of Cadwallon (Myv., vol. i, p. 220):— 'Prif arglwyt brolwyt bro din eithon, 'Chief lord and success of Din Eithon's land, "Din Eithon appears to have been a castle on the river Eithon in Maelienydd; but where was Clud exactly? Did it embrace a part of Radnorshire and Brycheiniog, and extend westwards to the Teifi? On the answer to this must depend, to some extent, possibly, the answer to another question which is more exactly in point here: How were Llwyd and Gwawl brought into contact with one another? It seems probable, at all events, that we cannot regard Llwyd's power as confined to Cemais, or even to the seven cantrefs of Dyfed. "As this rambling letter has grown so long, I must reserve for another day some queries which I wish to put to the readers of the Guardian. "New Year's Day, 1903." "JOHN RHYS. 49 PARTRISHOW CHURCH, BRECONSHIRE. BY THE VEN. ARCHDEACON THOMAS, M.A., F.S.A. A LONG-standing wish to see this remote and curious little church, inspired by Professor Westwood's account of it in the volume for 1856, and renewed by Mr. Bloxam's article in the 1874 volume, and intensified by Mr. Worthington Smith's admirable drawings in illustration of Sir Stephen Glynne's "Notes" in the volume for 1902, was happily gratified on the 7th of October, when I was taken to see it by our President. Passing the "Turpilli" Ogham stone in Glanusk Park, our first halt was at the newly-restored church of Llangattock, with its fine western tower; our second, at the daughter-church of Crickhowel, with its interesting effigies of— 1. Dame Sybil Pancefort, the foundress, whose deed of foundation in 1303 has been printed in the volume for 1893 (vol. x, p. 220). 2. A knight in chain armour, with the Pancefort shield; her husband or her son, both Sir Grimbalds. 3. Sir John Herbert, of Danycastell, knight, who died in 1666. 4. Dame Joan, his wife, daughter of Sir Charles Jones, of Dingeston, knight. And two other mutilated figures of William le Hunt, Serjeant-at-law, who died 1694, and Elizabeth his wife, daughter of Sir John Herbert, who died in 1703. As we climbed the hill to the north of the town, the ruined tower of the castle lay below us, and as we ascended higher the beautiful Vale of the Usk lay spread out in front. Crossing Bellfounder's Hill, with its fine oak timber, we looked down upon the Vale of the Grwyney, dominated by the lofty "Crûg" that crowns a spur of the Disgwylfa offshoot of the Black 6TH SER., VOL. IV. Mountain, and gave its own name to the later "Crickhowel." Descending and leaving the Valley of the lesser Grwyney (y Grwyne-fach) on the left, we followed that of the larger branch (y Grwyne-fawr) along a narrow twisting lane at the foot of the northern slope. At about four miles from Crickhowel the lane bifurcates; the branch which trends down to the river, which it crosses, is known further on as" Coalpit Lane,' and leads ultimately to Llanthony; along the other we continued our way as far as some farm-buildings called the "Celyn" (The Holly). Leaving the carriage here, we took the steep, narrow, well-worn lane that trends north-east, and after passing a farm with the suggestive name of "Llanfair" (St. Mary's), and following along what became something of a trackway, we suddenly dipped down into a secluded little dingle; and crossing the brook, we toiled for a couple of hundred yards or so up a steep and narrow cutting, and then on the right hand we turned into the churchyard of Partrishow, embosomed in trees, and presenting an ideal spot for quiet contemplation, away from the noise and bustle of the busy world. Sir Stephen Glynne's "Notes" and Mr. Worthington Smith's illustrations in the 1902 volume describe all that is of interest in it so fully that there is little left to add, and they are so fresh that there is no need to repeat them here. But the place, the situation, and the surroundings are so full of interest that one must plead an antiquary's privilege to linger on the spot, and, in thought, trace out its antecedents and its origin. There must have been many re-buildings on this site, for no part of the fabric is as old as the font, the inscription on which, "made in the time of Gennillin," 1 corresponds exactly in date with a record in the Book of Llandav: that the church was consecrated by Bishop Herewald (A.D. 1056-1103). But 1 "Kniwillin ap Rys goch kyff kenedl ystrad yw ac o hano vo i tyf gwyr penn Ros a Ilan ofor."-Mostyn MS. 2126, 130. |